E-frag comments on TWC 2016 prizes

21-6-2017 01:00

E-frag.net has blamed Azubu for the outstanding prize money from the 2016 edition of The World Championships (TWC).

In a Twitlonger post, E-frag.net reveals that it has taken Azubu, one of the main sponsors of the tournament, to arbitration after the streaming company allegedly failed to honour its contractual obligations, which included paying out the prize money after the event.

TWC 2016 took place from October 5-9 in Belgrade, Serbia, with Turkey winning the lion's share of the tournament's $100,000 prize pool after defeating Argentina in the final.

Turkey won TWC 2016

Earlier on Tuesday, Casper "⁠cadiaN⁠" Møller, who represented semi-finalist Denmark, took to Twitter to reveal that players had not yet been paid. According to the tournament's rulebook, all prizes were to be paid within 90 days of the event.

Azubu allegedly told E-frag that it does not have the funds to pay out the tournament's prize money, even though it recently acquired streaming rival Hitbox in a deal reportedly worth "tens of millions of dollars". The two companies have since merged to form Smashcast, but, according to a video blog by Richard Lewis, Azubu still owes money to several streamers and content creators.

"They [Azubu] asked us to accept a very small amount of the money owed and that we must tell the teams we had the prize pool paid to us," E-frag claimed.

"Azubu has been telling us that they do not have funds even though they recently purchased Hitbox for millions. Azubu denied buying hitbox when our lawyers spoke to them.

"The reason we have not yet gone public with this is in favour of reaching a mutual agreement with Azubu through our lawyers who advised us to not go public

"We have a full commitment to pay any prize pool we promise any team and to this date we have never refused to pay anyone money that is owed unlike a lot of other companies in the space who continue to thrive [while] owing thousands.

"We hope that we will be able to resolve this in arbitration but if not we will pay the pool through our own funds regardless.

"It's a very shameful situation to be in and we deeply apologise for breaking your trust in us, but in this matter it is truly out of our hands. We had a contract signed by law and are currently paying thousands in legal fees to enforce it."

The news of outstanding payment will certainly dent TWC's reputation. The second edition of the tournament already had a weaker talent pool compared to the debut season, which saw a star-studded France lineup led by Vincent "⁠Happy⁠" Schopenhauer secure first place.

Expected from shit Azubu

2017-06-21 01:03

12 replies

2017-06-21 01:04

8 replies

oh we did nothing wrong, we didnt expect this would happen when we partnered with the shadiest sponsor in esports

2017-06-21 01:06

7 replies

azubu is sooo bad

2017-06-21 01:08

6 replies

yes but efrag partnered with them knowing theyre scummy they should still have some money to pay the pros anyways even if azubu never payed

2017-06-21 01:11

5 replies

"if not we will pay the pool through our own funds regardless." anyways, they should pay RIGHT NOW and then keep on arbitration against azubu to get their money back

2017-06-21 03:44

4 replies

only cause they got called out

3 replies

capitalists

2017-06-21 03:45

2 replies

pretty much esports is becoming shady that adrenaline cyberleague was so fucking fishy dreamhack and esl owned by mtg wesa esea owned by esl and faceit parented with dreamhack

2017-06-21 03:53

1 reply

that's why we are seeing gamers sindicates coming to life (gamers union x.e)... a social proccess alike second industrial revolution xd

2017-06-21 03:58

They basically dont even exist now that they bought out Hitbox Arena

2017-06-21 01:24

2017-06-21 05:50

2017-06-21 12:05

Wtf is azubu

Shit Azubu

2017-06-21 01:05

144p incoming

azubu unite with best streaming platform HITBOX. now its SMASHCAST

2017-06-21 07:13

expected

who/what is azubu?

10 replies

Retard? Azubu was the "Twitch" when the streaming era came.

2017-06-21 01:40

9 replies

some people isnt internet veterans

2017-06-21 01:44

I thought it was own3d.tv, never heard of azubu at those times either

2017-06-21 02:03

Azubu launched like 5 years after Justin.tv

2017-06-21 02:19

I thought it was Justin tv?

2017-06-21 03:16

Justin.tv was Twitch.

2017-06-21 03:18

No it wasnt. Azubu was a failed attempt to compete with jtv/twitch. Nt though.

2017-06-21 05:05

No it wasn't, justin.tv was twitch.

2017-06-21 10:40

i was being irony you idiot

2017-06-21 17:58

Saludos amigo de Argentina! No estés tan enojado.

2017-06-21 21:25

Blame on Azubu, i hope they go full public with this and destroy them, they will never be close to twitch anyways

Azubu is dead now homie. They bought out Hitbox and made a new platform. So Azubu isn't technically a thing anymore.

2017-06-21 01:10

Whatever it is , it will still be shit compared to twitch

2017-06-21 01:43

what he said

2017-06-21 02:50

parent company still has to pay outstanding bills though

2017-06-21 10:33

Never said they didn't.

2017-06-24 23:55

So sad for the guys that played this tournament, the majority was young incoming talents and they get this news holly fuck.

This is acually pretty good news tbh. If you consider their situation, they might have never seen the money. This way they at least should receive them, even though quite late.

2017-06-21 14:28

expected...not the first time azubu is doing shit

2017-06-21 01:13

Azubu lol

2017-06-21 01:18

Why did they make a deal with Azubu in the first place?

2017-06-21 01:28

because azubu gave alot of money?

2017-06-21 02:51

They promised a lot of money. Giving it is another thing :()

2017-06-21 10:30

Fuck azubu I remember watching some games from this tournment on their site and its shit. Hope to never see them again

2017-06-21 01:31

Well, It's better now since they made a deal with twitch so it's all good for the next tourney lol

2017-06-21 01:34

Azubu is smashcast.tv now, atm it has like no more than 1k total people watching streams, that's so fucking bad considering the money they invested, it will be dead in less than 1 year.

2017-06-21 21:58

azubu? rofl this very same organisation or company or whatever the fuck it really is, has always been shady since several years ago, when I was playing stracraft at semipro level and following the scene, they were the shadiest motherfuckers out there, not even people in the know knew what the fuck they (azubu) were really up to, and multiple players and voices shared negative experriences about them, at least in korea

2017-06-21 01:32

they shared negative experiences after taking azubus money for a year or so

2017-06-21 10:34

We understand ''Why T1 players didnt take part''

Totally

2017-06-21 14:31

Unacceptable in 2k17...

2017-06-21 01:48

Yes, obviously Azubu is definitely to blame for not paying, but so is E-Frag. Them paying the cash prices shouldn't solely rely on them receiving sponsor-money.. what a horrible excuse. This is E-Frag saying that they either have no equity or that they're in debt themselves. They're trying to shift the blame to another company in trouble, but the truth is that they're both accountable.

14 replies

what I read is that azubu would provide the prize and it was legally binding , efrag even said if the worst happen they will pay it themselves.

2017-06-21 02:24

E-Frag has the obligation to pay the prize money, not Azubu. If they had made a deal to make Azubu pay on their behalf, that's their mistake. Another mistake is not "collecting" the money beforehand. It has now been about half a year since the money should have been paid, E-Frag is definitely not without fault. The reason why I'm quick to judge them, is that this has been seen countless times before. The sutiation where an organizer blaims missing payment from sponsors as a reason for not handing the price money has been seen many times before.

2017-06-21 02:33

11 replies

im just saying if someone screws you what can you do? luckily efrag say they will pay out of their pocket. just stating what the article say. they are asking teams to have some patience and understand the situation. 6 months is kinda bad thats true, but i wouldnt bash on efrag yet after they make a statement like this. if they fail again im sure their reputation is dead so i think we can give them benefit of doubt edit: at least for a little while more edit2: the best thing would be if they just pay the teams, and then battle eith azubu. so i guess I agree with you after all

2017-06-21 02:38

E-Frag isn't some sort of personal entity that you should pity. They could most likely have paid the price money and demanded it covered by Azuba as pr. honored contract, but it seems like they need the liquidity. Obviously it's hard to say without seeing the exact contract, but either E-Frag have made some really incompetent contracts, or they are simply just trying to shift blame, as an excuse for not respecting their obligation. In either case, they are also to blame.

2017-06-21 02:44

i dont know anything about this case. what I can tell from experience is that azubu is the shadiest organisation or company ever in esport. ive seen them do crazy stuff in starcraft and then just dissapear efrags fault for joining force with such org though. they are really infamous in starcraft community

2017-06-21 02:46

I can agree on that. I was just reading everything I could find about Azubg/Hitbox/Smashcast, Martin Klimscha and their incompetent investor Lars Windhorst.

2017-06-21 02:57

lolwut. if you have a contract with a company saying they'll pay something for you, you yourself will not keep enough money in the bank to pay yourself in case the contractor falls through. if you have that kind of money you might as well do everything yourself. azubu will have to pay. they will pay eventually. theyre just delaying, every day money becomes worth less, and they get more interest.

2017-06-21 10:36

"you yourself will not keep enough money in the bank to pay yourself in case the contractor falls through." Maybe not for that particular instance, although they should, but regardless they should have a certain amount of equity for similar instances.

2017-06-21 13:39

yes and efrag can probably pay out the prize pool themselves, but as soon as they pay, they lose that money, and theyre not sure whether they'll get anything from azubu. its azubus contractual obligation. efrag could be really nice to the players and pay them, but that would be dumb, business wise. what are those players going to do, boycot their next event?

2017-06-21 19:55

"theyre not sure whether they'll get anything from azubu." This should have nothing to do with their obligation to pay the prize money, as I already stated. "what are those players going to do, boycot their next event?" Yes.

2017-06-21 22:38

2017-06-21 23:32

:0)

what are they going to do? if they go, they could get fucked again, but if they dont go, they dont make any money for sure.

2017-06-21 23:44

+1 Exactly what I thought.

2017-06-21 02:36

LOL. Thanks for sharing this news MIRAA Team Turkey didn't get money aswell right?

Nope. None of the teams got any money yet

2017-06-21 21:08

Funny a company that charges money for non potato quality streams can't even pay those small amounts

The fun part of all of this for me is, while watching this tournament it was buffering for everyone on azubu, so I did a little shit talking and got banned by Efrag from their channel, and now this is just sweet :)

2017-06-21 03:41

Gamers union where r uuuu

2017-06-21 03:47

What a joke, expected from 3rd world company. $100k is not some colossal amount. They need to pay off the prize money according to agreement even if they have to take out a loan to do it and then deal with Azubu separately. Trying to scapegoat another company almost a year later doesn't do them any favors with the teams or players.

2017-06-21 03:49

#boycottazubu

2017-06-21 04:43

u have to use something in order to boycott it

2017-06-21 05:13

well at least now we know nobody will use that shitty ass website ever again

2017-06-21 05:57

(players had not yet been paid) GG !

2017-06-21 07:18

"The outstanding prize money"? Am I missing something here?

2017-06-21 10:28

144p price money LUL

2017-06-21 11:38

again azubu lul

2017-06-21 11:48

scammed by azubu

2017-06-21 12:11

so unexpected..azubu lmfao worst shit ever

2017-06-21 12:20

Azubu in 2017

2017-06-21 14:59

Azubu doesn't pay even the streamers that it hires, an unscrupulous company.

Why they even go then lol

2017-06-21 15:01

I can talk about what happened in Brazil. Here it hired several famous youtubers and was really giving a lot to them. But then suddenly it started to delay payments and closed the site without warnings. After that its image was well stained.

2017-06-21 15:07

Obviusly..

2017-06-21 15:26

Azubu in any year, rofl

2017-06-21 15:50

Well I did not get money for 3rd place in Brno AMD Cyber Cup in 2005 its already 12 years :D I think neo and co did not get either for 1st place :D hope efrag will solve the problem , if not they should charge azubu over law

2017-06-21 17:06

Worst organisation with worst streaming platform

2017-06-21 19:14

Man, I really feel Availer being in the middle of this shit with nothing to do. But hey - at least Intel is paying 1million and 2x500k to the winners opcoming premier tournaments this year -.-

2017-06-21 20:57